Next Week's Yesod class on Contemporary Period
Joey
There was a rather small turnout last evening, although I think it was
a quite interesting discussion. Increasingly, (as we moved through
the medieval and Renaissance time frame), we began to ask questions
pertaining to "how Jews may have imagined who they were, in terms of a
larger world conceptualizing things around them". This coming week,
we will be dealing with the Enlightenment's impact on Jews in central
Europe, and its delayed effects on eastern European Jews (in Poland
and the Pale of Settlement). What did it mean for us to construct
Jewish identity, to come up with political, spiritual and even
pedagogical strategies - in light of assumptions that people should
assimilate? Naturally, the possibilities for assimilation varied from
country to country. All of these issues influence the ways that we
ourselves have come to imagine our own choices today.
Intellectual history (the history of ideas) has blossomed like never
before, within a Jewish academic context, over the past 30 years, and
our assignment is key for next week. I handed out ONE (only!)
article. It ends midstream, but it contains some interesting thinking
on the subject of German Jews during the second half of the 19th
century and into the early 20th century. I think it's really
important that you make an effort to pick it up from the office. I'll
give it to Mario, so that you can get it. Although it focuses on
western European Jewish ideas, it's really about Jews in the world
ever since. Please read it, if you get the chance.
It's around now, as we get together for one more class in the history
unit (next week), and anticipate a break until April - that I'd like
you to join me in coming up with the kinds of questions we might ask
in the April "Quandaries" unit. I know for a fact that we'll spend
one session on contemporary aspects of Jewish faith. Rabbi Tzvi
Fisher from the Portland Kollel will join me on April 21st, in order
to represent a traditional viewpoint. Another piece will focus on
what Israel means to the Jews today. But beyond that - I'd like this
last history article to stimulate other questions. See if you can
post some questions that come to mind for you in the meantime.
Thanks,
Rabbi Joey
Joel Yasskin
(503) 206-9099
Joey Wolf
Okay, Joel. Does this mean you will not be there for the final segment in April?
Joel Yasskin
April may be possible. I'd like to continue. I'm unsure what my schedule looks like then. I'm starting a new quarter with 12 graduate hours, an assistantship, and a part time gardening and landscaping company.
shalom,
Racheli Ross
Joey Wolf
What an interesting piece to read…. First, I’ll recap it. Sayed Kashua is an Israeli Arab columnist for Haaretz, Israel’s New York Times. He’s also an award-winning producer of a sitcom that depicts an Israeli Arab family living amidst cultural contradictions – it’s comedic to the extreme, and most distinctly unfavored in the Arab press. So in this column he has received what he considers to be flattering regards from a now elder communist party statesman, a Palestinian “freedom fighter” who resides in Israel, turned 80. It sets up an opportunity for a visit, but this will require a long drive with his wife and two children in the back seat. As all kids do, his own get into numerous skirmishes and catcalling in perfect Hebrew. He warns them not to speak in Hebrew in front of the admired Arab elder, and they settle a deal: he’ll pay them handsomely for behaving themselves. The kids fall asleep in the car, and he tells his wife about overhearing the teacher in the children’s school (at the end of their lesson), speaking about Christopher Columbus and presenting the argument that he was a Jew. The teacher lures them into a scholarly investigation of sorts. Columbus arrived in the New World on Sukkot. Why Sukkot? He was bored on the long voyage, and had a translator explaining biblical passages originally in Aramaic, translating them to……. You guessed it – Hebrew. And scientists have discovered that his DNA (presumably from the exhumed body) proves that…….well, Spanish authorities won’t say…….!!!!!
Indeed, back then in Spain, we were all so much a part of Islamic culture. We spoke Arabic, participated in the occupational system that Muslims did. We were scientists and poets and mathematicians. We even rewrote the boundaries between us and the Arabs, we were so much like them. And later on, when Christians reconquered the Iberian peninsula, they wanted to make us like them. And we went along with it – to a point. We converted en masse. Sort of. And then when we were expelled, not only did they wonder if they weren’t Jewish, we entered Ashkenazic Jewish places in Europe that made us feel like we weren’t Jewish ourselves. We probably, in all our self-consciousness, induced a degree of paranoia, of skepticism, and wonderment about who the Jews really were, and what WE were supposed to do – NOW THAT WE’RE HERE. Well, now that Columbus has conquered America – a land “without people” – we learn that he’s a Jew. What a credit! Talk about revisionist history!
Rabbi Joey – Shavua tov!
From:
5770-yeso...@googlegroups.com
[mailto:5770-yeso...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of Racheli Ross
Sent: Saturday, February 20, 2010
3:11 PM
To:
5770-yeso...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Next Week's Yesod
class on Contemporary Period
I read the article below yesterday in Harretz and thought of our last class. I couldn't find it on the English page of Haaretz, but thought you would enjoy it:
Joel Yasskin
I know this subject is from last class, but I just read some more on the piece that argues that "conversion" to Judaism didn't actually occur until 100 CE. In other words, people who became Hebrews, Israelites, part of the tribes of Israel were either born into it or absorbed without any actual ceremony of conversion? I've heard that in "biblical times" -BC--that Jewish men who married non Jewish women and brought the women into the community became Jews, and similarly, people in general who lived among/with Jews and lived according to Jewish custom, likewise, were absorbed or assimilated into the Jewish community and considered Jewish.
(503) 206-9099
-----Original Message-----
From: Joey Wolf [mailto:joey...@havurahshalom.org]
Sent: Saturday, February 20, 2010 06:27 PM
To: 5770-yeso...@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: Next Week's Yesod class on Contemporary Period
What an interesting piece to read?. First, I?ll recap it. Sayed Kashua is an Israeli Arab columnist for Haaretz, Israel?s New York Times. He?s also an award-winning producer of a sitcom that depicts an Israeli Arab family living amidst cultural contradictions ? it?s comedic to the extreme, and most distinctly unfavored in the Arab press. So in this column he has received what he considers to be flattering regards from a now elder communist party statesman, a Palestinian ?freedom fighter? who resides in Israel, turned 80. It sets up an opportunity for a visit, but this will require a long drive with his wife and two children in the back seat. As all kids do, his own get into numerous skirmishes and catcalling in perfect Hebrew. He warns them not to speak in Hebrew in front of the admired Arab elder, and they settle a deal: he?ll pay them handsomely for behaving themselves. The kids fall asleep in the car, and he tells his wife about overhearing the teacher in the children?s school (at the end of their lesson), speaking about Christopher Columbus and presenting the argument that he was a Jew. The teacher lures them into a scholarly investigation of sorts. Columbus arrived in the New World on Sukkot. Why Sukkot? He was bored on the long voyage, and had a translator explaining biblical passages originally in Aramaic, translating them to??. You guessed it ? Hebrew. And scientists have discovered that his DNA (presumably from the exhumed body) proves that??.well, Spanish authorities won?t say??.!!!!!
Indeed, back then in Spain, we were all so much a part of Islamic culture. We spoke Arabic, participated in the occupational system that Muslims did. We were scientists and poets and mathematicians. We even rewrote the boundaries between us and the Arabs, we were so much like them. And later on, when Christians reconquered the Iberian peninsula, they wanted to make us like them. And we went along with it ? to a point. We converted en masse. Sort of. And then when we were expelled, not only did they wonder if they weren?t Jewish, we entered Ashkenazic Jewish places in Europe that made us feel like we weren?t Jewish ourselves. We probably, in all our self-consciousness, induced a degree of paranoia, of skepticism, and wonderment about who the Jews really were, and what WE were supposed to do ? NOW THAT WE?RE HERE. Well, now that Columbus has conquered America ? a land ?without people? ? we learn that he?s a Jew. What a credit! Talk about revisionist history!
Rabbi Joey ? Shavua tov!
Jason Templeman
Here's my attempt to write down a central quandry. I don't mean to beat around the bush, but I found it was a little difficult to form this thought so please excuse my indirectness (and incompleteness!):
If we take as a given that to be Jewish is to obey the covenant, we need to know what it means to obey the covenant. How do we decide what approach to adhere to, from among the different movements and philosophies within Judaism? Can we decide for ourselves? If we decide for ourselves, are we really obeying the covenant or are we just picking the portions that we feel like following?
I see problems with simply granting that the most literal or orthodox interpretation is automatically the most correct in its view.
Certainly orthodoxy goes along with observance, so it’s easy to see why orthodoxy would be seen by default as the most correct way to observe the covenant--in an orthodox approach the intent to be observant is given strong priority.
But in a way orthodoxy is simply a particular form of being observant. If one really believes that a more interpreted, less literal view is a truer to the meaning and intent of the covenant, then wouldn’t orthodoxy actually be a departure from true obedience and true observance?
This might sound like a reach, but it’s actually what I wonder about. I have difficulty with the formula, “if you want to be truly Jewish, then be orthodox.” My difficulty comes from the assumption that an orthodox approach is more correct than other approaches. This is a problem before I even come to contemplating what orthodoxy actually implies, because I distrust the assumption itself. In general, I find it a red flag when any given philosophical approach is given the benefit of special assumptions that make it immune from speculation and competing views.
On the other hand, I’m not sure that non-orthodox approaches to Judaism fully wrestle with the question. I understand that people can really believe in a different approach, but alternatives to orthodoxy seem to be half-formed at times, or perhaps just trying to find their way in the world (which may be exactly what is supposed to happen). I speak for myself here: do I really try to be as serious about being Jewish, as I would be if I were traditionally observant?
F. Davis Woods-Morse
Hate that I missed my bus.